EVERYTHING SHARES IN THE BEAUTIFUL

On this account it is that the com mixture of the
intellectual and sensible in man is effected by the Divine Being, as
the description of the cosmogony instructs us. It tells us that God,
taking dust of the ground, formed the man, and by an inspiration from
Himself He planted life in the work of His hand, that thus the earthy
might be raised up to the Divine, and so one certain grace of equal
value might pervade the whole creation, the lower nature being mingled
with the supramundane. Since, then, the intellectual nature had a
previous existence, and to each of the angelic powers a certain
operation was assigned, for the organization of the whole, by the
authority that presides over all things, there was a certain power
ordained to hold together and sway the earthly region , constituted
for this purpose by the power that administers the Universe. Upon that
there was fashioned that thing moulded of earth, an "image" copied
from the superior Power. Now this living being was man. In him, by an
ineffable influence, the godlike beauty of the intellectual nature was
mingled. He to whom the administration of the earth has been consigned
takes it ill and thinks it not to be borne, if, of that nature which
has been subjected to him, any being shall be exhibited bearing
likeness to his transcendent dignity.